Finding What Is Not There
by Kabochya
Summary: Roxas left because he had a war to fight, and he didn't look back because his life was a lie. But what happens when that lie becomes a sacred truth to those he left behind?
1. Chapter 1

**Kingdom Hearts 2 _kicked ass. _As far as I'm concerned it's only flaw was the ending, and not _how_ it ended, but that it had an ending at all. I'm all psyked for KH3, but, in the mean time, I think there area few loose ends to tie up. Because some friendships are just meant to be. And some bonds just won't be broken. **

"We were all going to get together and help him" The woman at the accessory shop said softly. "He had been having troubles, and we all said, 'tomorrow, we'll all get to the bottom of this'." She had a far off, distant look in her eyes. The two youngsters in front of her nodded solemnly.

"What happened to him?" the lady said in a firmer, almost panicked tone. "Where did he go?"

"We're not sure." Olette murmured. "We didn't even think about him until we found that picture. Then we started remembering him, and we couldn't remember why we ever forgot."

The lady handed the photo back over the counter, looking as if someone had stepped on her grave. Her eyes flitted over the faces of the teens that had brought this to her attention. She then looked further, across the street, to where the man who ran the item shop was also staring at the youngsters.

"Did…_everyone_…forget?" she asked.

"From what we've seen, yes." Pence looked glum. "We've been showing that picture around all morning, to our friends, to our classmates, to anyone who would have known him. A lot of people recognize him, but no one has seen him, or even thought about him, in a long time, and nobody knows why."

"We're going to try and hold some sort of meeting. We're trying to get all the people who were going to help him out before to attend. It'll probably be held in the sand-lot." Olette's big pleading eyes just cried out 'won't you come too?'

"Don't you think the two things are related?" the saleslady blurted out. "Don't you think it strange that the boy someone was harassing and stalking just disappeared like that?"

"We do at that, ma'am." Pence nodded.

"Do you have any ideas who's responsible?"

"Not really, no, just our own suspicions."

"And those are?"

Pence leaned in closer. "The thief. The thief that stole all the pictures. It was like he was looking for something." His voice lowered. "It went after the pictures first, and then it started after the real deal. And…" There was a dangerous edge to his words. "any one strong enough to steal the very _words _from our mouths might just be good enough to steal memories, too."

Wide-eyed and fearful, the woman took in what he was saying. "I'll be there. In the sand-lot. Just let me know when."

The Accessory Shop lady did indeed attend the meeting in the sandlot that evening, as well as the man from the items shop and the struggle promoter, and just about every school child between the ages of twelve and eighteen. The parents were all there, the employees from the train station, over a dozen teachers, and people who had been his neighbors or had just seen him every-so-often on the street also came. The lot was crowded to the brim, with more people than even the yearly struggle champion match would bring. People left work or closed up shop early, ditched part-time jobs (only to find their boss also in the crowds), and left their dinners growing cold on the table to come to the impromptu gathering. The meeting wasn't even supposed to have been held until at least tomorrow, but far too many remembered how this 'we'll fix it tomorrow' idea had been the reason they had forgotten in the first place.

Seifer, standing on one of the benches, called for quiet. "All right, first things first: when was the last time anyone saw him?"

Not surprisingly, it was the missing boy's friends, the same ones in the picture with him, that stepped up.

"It was just before summer vacation ended." Pence said, "He had been really glad to hear that everyone was going to pitch in and search around for whatever it was that had been stalking him and causing so much trouble. He ran out to get ice cream. He didn't come back. And none of us even noticed he was gone."

"Right, so that's what, five, six months now?"

The kids just nodded.

"Do we have any more proof? School records, finger prints, a fucking birth-certificate?"

"Why would we need any of that?" Someone asked.

"Stop stalling and lets get to the bottom of this!" the crowd didn't like Seifer's casual approach.

"Seriously people, we need anything at all on this guy. More pictures, newspaper clippings, his name on something, a lock of hair or a drop of blood, _anything_."

The crowd didn't see the importance.

"This isn't my idea of how to get this done, either." Seifer grumbled. "But we need to if we're ever going to figure out what happened. I tried to put in a missing person's report in today, and they wouldn't let me."

People were now listening with more respect.

"I went from the guy in the office to the chief of police to the friggin Mayor's office, but the fact is that there no record that this kid was ever in Twilight Town, or even existed in the first place.

The people in the crowd didn't think that was fair. Seifer ran his hand down his face, looking harassed. Like most everyone else, he was having trouble wrapping his brain around what was happening. Unfortunately, as head of the town disciplinary committee, he needed to at least act like he knew what he was doing.

"Okay, here's what we're going to do." He addressed the crowd. "Most of you are going to go home and turn everything upside-down. Gather up anything that might prove he was here. Something he might have touched that hasn't been touched or used since, something he wrote or signed. I know that a lot of pictures were stolen right before he disappeared." Seifer felt himself growing more confident as he spoke. This could work, and the people were hanging on his every word. "But a lot of them were returned, and there's no way those things could have gotten _every_ photo of that guy. Somewhere, there has to be more, hidden in an album or a shoe box that no one's opened for years." Now he turned to some of the people of his gang, and some of the people in the front row. "The rest of us will start a search for any other clues. We'll go over what happened, and try and figure out where he went after people saw him last. Got it? Okay, now scram."

People filed out slowly, until Seifer had his boys start yelling at people to get a move on. "If yoose not on the search party, go home! We don't need you getting in the way."

Finally, the only people left were the ones that had decided to help with the search. Aside from Seifer's boys, there were those three brats, Setzer, some more of the struggle contestants, two police officers, the guy from the item shop, a scattering of teenagers who had had class with the missing kid, and the boy's former neighbors.

Hayner pulled out a large rolled up sheet of paper, and laid it out on a bench. Seifer was surprised to see that it was a gnarled map of the town.

"We made this over summer vacation, when the tunnels were closed. It has all our shortcuts, our meeting places, stuff like that." Hayner said. "A lot of it is copied from other maps we got at the library, so it's accurate down to the square meter."

Fuu whistled, but gave no other sign of approval.

"Those things would attack when no one was around to help him." He continued, and Seifer wondered if the boy was going to cry; there was a sharp pinch in his voice. "So I think we can eliminate the tram common and market street. People are there all the time, and if there was something there, it's long since been swept away."

Seifer nodded. "This'll be useful later on. It'll help us get inside his head, see where he might have run to, if he was trying to get away from something."

"Where should we look first?" Vivi asked. "The tunnels, or some of their hideouts?"

"Neither." Seifer said. "Back when we were all planning to search the town the first time, we all agreed that the most suspicious place was that old mansion beyond the woods." He pointed at the map, where the hole in the wall of the common was marked. "That still holds true. Even if the mansion itself has nothing to do with it, the woods are isolated, and few people ever go there. It's a good place to bury a body."

It was on the way to the woods that the neighbors handed over another clue.

"The house is empty." The woman was in her forties, and was trailed by her three oldest kids. "And as much as I try, I can't remember anyone but the boy ever living there. I don't remember him ever having parents, or anyone else. And it's a pretty big house, especially for just one person to live in."

"What all's inside?" Seifer asked.

"Not much." Pence said. "There's furniture and stuff, but most of his things are missing."

"We did find some of it, though." Olette said. "But it was all in boxes, like he had just moved in, or just bought it."

"You broke in?" the one of the cops asked.

"Nah. Roxas used to let us in through his window, cause of curfew and all. Broken latch, you see." Pence said.

"Did you find any proof of existence?"

"Found a whole lotta beer in the fridge." Hayner commented offhandedly.

"And Roxas didn't drink. Not just because he was too young. He didn't like how it messed up his skateboarding." Olette said.

"Anything else?" Seifer asked the neighbors.

"Kinda, yeah." One of the kids, a girl about fourteen spoke up. "Nobody remembers when he moved _in_, but we all remember when the Curtis family moved _out_. I used to play with their kids in the yard."

"Yeah." Her brother said. "And that was only about four or five years ago.

"That place was up for rent for a while." The oldest of the neighbor kids said. "At first there weren't any real permanent residents, just some guys who would crash there once in a while. That might explain all the beer in the fridge."

"Okay." Seifer said. "So the kid got in through the broken window, found nobody home, and just decided to make it his permanent place to crash. He's gotta be a runaway or something."

"No way." Pence said. "We were in that house loads of times. The place was totally different. More lived in, ya'know? Someone's must've moved all of Roxas' stuff out, and tried to replace it. That's why it looks like someone just moved in, 'cause the people weren't finished unpacking all the new stuff."

They had reached the hole in the wall.

"Okay." Said Seifer. "Now we split up. Fuu, go with the Wrights and go north. Vivi, take the officers and…Mr…Item Shop Guy…and go east. Rai, I want you and Setzer to round up these kids and go south. All of you, go slowly, and don't get lost. Look out for any little detail. If you find something, use your head. Don't touch anything, call in for help on the cellular first." Seifer indicated the cell phones they all had. "As for you three," Seifer rounded on the Brat Pack. "You're coming with me. We're going up ahead to that mansion."

Seifer waited until they were deep in the woods and far away from the other groups before he halted company and demanded answers.

"You're hiding something." He said, "And I want to know what it is."

The kids said nothing, which only strengthened his conviction.

"Well?" he said expectantly. "It's something to do with this case, then you'd better speak up. The more you cooperate, the better chance we have of finding your friend."

Olette started to say something, but decided against it. The group started walking again. Silence reigned, and the tree brats all had deep expressions on.

"So…" Siefer drew out. The tree looked at him as if they expected him to restate his question. "How do you expect to get past that big gate."

"Huh? Oh, that. Sora unlocked that a long time ago."

"Hayner!" Pence hissed.

"Ooops."

"Sora, eh? Who's Sora?"

"Sora's…a friend."

"Rea-lly? And is he here today?"

"No."

"And did he ever meet Roxas?"

"Not that we know of."

"Uh-huh. And where did you meet this 'Sora'.

"You remember Sora." Hayner said. "He was that guy that pwn'd us all in the struggle matches."

"Oh. Him. Where did he come from?"

"We're not really sure." Oletted said. "He just showed up one day."

"Uh-huh."

"Right before school started."

Seifer walked a few more steps, and then stopped in his tracks.

"Right before school started. As in, 'Right before Roxas disappeared?"

"No." Hayner said grimly. "As in 'the _day after_ Roxas disappeared."

"He was looking for some friends of his." Olette explained as they poked around the gated area around the Mansion. "We're pretty sure he found them; we even got to meet Kairi. She was real nice, just like Sora was."

"Sora reminded us of someone." She blurted out. "We couldn't understand why. But I wish we had taken some pictures of him, because then we could have shown you all the resemblance."

"Do you think they were somehow related?" Seifer said in his usual baritone.

"Maybe. Maybe not." She got on her knees and poked around the hedges. "But Sora could go places none of the rest of us could. He was the kind of person you never doubted would find what he was looking for."

"You have any way of finding this guy?"

"No, not really. He always showed up unannounced. And he hasn't comeback in a long time."

"So he got what he was after, and now doesn't have a reason to travel." Seifer was getting a little frustrated. This was getting them nowhere. Another dead end, another string of _interesting_ but _useless_ facts.

A banging, clacking sound brought the two up from their evaluation of the shrubbery. Hayner had the front door by the handles, and was pulling vigorously to get them open. It wasn't working.

"Sora must have locked it behind him." Pence said. Hayner gave the barrier one last rattle, and threw his hands up in exasperation.

"Hey, don't worry. At least the gate is still open. If we need to look inside the mansion, we can just break the door down." Pence soothed.

Hayner wasn't impressed. Neither was Seifer, for that matter. A call from the gate got their attention. It was Setzer.

"Find anything?" the pretty-boy asked.

"Nada. But we should keep looking."

"Not today. It's getting late. These kids need to get home."

"No we don't. Our parents don't expect us home for hours." Olette protested politely.

Setzer ignored her. "We should be escorting them back to town."

The children protested this treatment, but Seifer got the hint. He herded the trio past the gates and into the woods. Silently, he was amazed that worked. Hayner, at the very least, would have pitched a fit, but then again, the squirt had been awfully silent during this whole ordeal. As they tromped the short distance back to town, Seifer cast long glances at Setzer, who seemed more interested in getting back to the dirt-free town than giving any hint as to what had abruptly canceled this excursion.

Selected portions of the other groups were waiting for them when they got to the hole in the wall.

"That should be everyone." One of the police officers said when he saw them. "We'll walk you home." He said to the brats.

By this time they had all gotten the hint that there was something going on that the adults weren't letting them in on. Scowling, Hayner let himself be led away by the officers and the family of neighbors. The other two kids seemed more concerned with whether Hayner was going to flip his lid than putting up a fight of their own.

As soon as they were out of sight, Seifer rounded on his gang. "And?" he demanded. "Why the change in plans?"

"The police are getting involved." Fuu said. "After all, if there is a dead body or a missing child, then they're the best equipped to find it."

**I already have the next chapter written, I just need to see how this one goes over before I post it. And if anyone is wondering what's going on with my other fics, well, lets say that school got in the way. But it's summer, I graduate this afternoon (in about two hours, actually), and now there's nothing to do but sit back, relax, and try and pick up the threads of where I left off. **


	2. Proof of Existance

**From the reviews that were posted, it seems that some people don't understand the concept of what I'm trying to do here. I'm not deliberately 'contradicting the game,' I know very well that there were two Twilight Towns, and two of every person there. Later on, there _will_ be an explanation for why the people in the 'real' Twilight town are remembering things that they shouldn't.**

"So what finally got them to change their minds?" Seifer was wondering. He sat in the empty sand-lot and stared down at his water bottle. They were waiting for the police arrive so they could ask some questions.

"Finally got proof that the kid existed." Fuu said in her silky smooth voice.

"Yer' never gonna' believe this one, boss." Rai said, gesturing with the hand holding his protein shake.

"Hmm?"

"Roxas had a criminal record."

Rai was right for once; Seifer didn't believe it, he just snorted at them.

"It's true." Vivi piped up.

Seifer snapped out of it. With a smirk, he asked. "So, what'd he get nailed for? Graffiti? Skate-boarding where he wasn't supposed to? Being just that damn aggravating?"

"Assault and Battery." Fuu said.

Seifer had to raise his eyebrows in disbelief.

"They got mug shots and everything. Some detectives came down to show us some pictures."

"Who'd he beat up?" Seifer asked.

"That's why we're supposed to be waiting here until the police arrive again." Vivi said. "According to the report, it was you."

Seifer spat water all over the diminutive member of his circle, and then burst out laughing. "A-ha ha haha ha! Haw haw haha ha!" he gripped his sides and slapped his knee. "You had me going there for a minute!" He guffawed, and continued laughing. But none of the others thought it was quite so funny.

"We're totally serious." Fuu said.

"We didn't think you'd believe it eithah, so we made sure those cops would bring back some of dem files." Rai said.

Silence reigned for another ten minutes until the police arrived. Two men in button-down shirts led the way, and strode confidently over. They were followed by the same two cops who had been in the search party.

Being the town disciplinary committee, Seifer and his group worked with the police on many occasions. They all knew the drill, and calmly gave their names for the record, etc, etc, and the two men pulled up another bench for them to sit on so they could start this talk.

"Seifer, this is starting to be a very touchy issue we have here." One of them started. The other one lit up a cigarette and looked bored. "This started out as a wild goose chase for an alleged missing person, and it's looking more and more like a murder case by the minute."

"My friends tell me that I'm somehow part of this report you guys have." Seifer said. The man handed over a case summary for him to read.

Opening the manila envelope, Seifer first saw what was definitely a picture of that damn punk, Roxas. He had sort of bored/annoyed look on his face, and he was backed up against that lined wall that showed the person's height. The only real notable thing about this picture, aside from the obvious, was that Roxas appeared to be wearing all black. Which stuck in his mind for some reason.

The file captions and reports were written in the usual clipped professional tone, boring, but at least it got to the point. According to the report, the suspect had allegedly been apprehended out on the streets after curfew by one Town Disciplinary Committee (TDD) #1. After a brief exchange of words, in which TDC Seifer Yamada had attempted to obtain the under-aged youth's name, and order him home, the situation had escalated into violence. Neighbors had called the police when they had heard the angry voices on the street, and a black-and-white had arrived at the scene to find the TDC1 in need of immediate medical assistance, and the kid was still going at it. There was another, unidentified, person in the vicinity, who apparently was trying to pull the suspect off of the victim. This person fled ad the appearance of the police. The suspect surrendered without incident.

Seifer flipped the page, and almost wished he hadn't. Now, it was his own face splashed over the files, pictures of him bruised and beaten. One hand flew up to finger a scar on his temple, mostly hidden by hair and hat. He couldn't recall actually ever getting that scar, but in the pictures, he had a long gash in that spot. He hurriedly busied himself with the text portions.

The suspect had refused to talk and refused the right to council. His finger prints drew no record from anywhere in town, or in any of the neighboring towns.

This last one bothered Seifer. Where had he come from?

While 'the victim' had definitely been attacked by some sort of weapon, none were found at the scene or on the suspect. While the going theory that the unidentified witness had possibly removed whatever had been used, some evidence suggested other wise. Here the report got a little vague and iffy. The boy had apparently struck an over-zealous interrogator down, and the marks on the man were definitely not caused by bare hands. Comparisons between the victim and the injured detective were similar, and probably done by the same tool. The officer in question mentioned seeing some 'flash of light' before the boy hit him with a weapon he couldn't identify.

Seifer frowned. None of this sounded like the Roxas he had known.

Another inconsistency was the fact that, despite being searched thoroughly several times, the kid kept on getting out of where he should be and into where he shouldn't. The brat was a regular Houdini. While he made no statements and gave no answers, he didn't seem to be in a real hurry to get any where, for he never once used his lock-picking skills to try and get out. This may have been due to prior knowledge of incoming events, as after a little over twenty-four hours in police custody, a fire had broken out in the building, and the suspect walked out the doors, greeted the arsonist cordially, and disappeared into thin air.

Seifer had to re-read that last part. He remembered the time the police headquarters had nearly burned down. He hadn't heard anything about any breakouts. In fact, he couldn't really remember at all what he had been doing at the time. And that whole 'disappearing into thin air' deal made him nervous; one could say that Roxas had done just that a couple months ago. He handed back the file.

The detective that was now mostly hidden in the fallen night and his own personal cloud of smoke took back the file. His partner took over the talking once again.

"You can see how this is causing some problems over at headquarters." He said.

"Tell me something." Seifer said to him. "Do you remember the break out at all?"

The man sighed. "I remember the fire. I don't remember there being a kid there."

"What about the officers whose names are on the reports? What about them?"

"That's for the police to handle."

Seifer accepted that there were probably some very confused police out there who were either remembering weird things or trying to rationalize the strange holes in their memories.

"So." The man continued. "Kid comes to town, and from the looks of it, he's not alone. Goes looking for fights, or maybe he just doesn't know about the curfew, and doesn't take kindly to authority. Doesn't care about going to jail, because he knows his buddies will bust him out."

"Uh-huh."

"But what I don't get is the other stuff. I mean, somehow he was able to get into school and live around town for a real long time without anyone questioning where he came from. He even was able to pull the wool over _your_ eyes. But then, what, something bigger and badder than him and his buddies comes into town, and wipes him out with out anyone noticing?"

Seifer nodded and added his piece. "Nobody around here has ever dealt with anything that could alter someone's memories or steal our very words. We don't have any clue as to who might be involved, or what might be at stake. But I think I might know someone who does."

"Yeah? And who would that be?"

"Another person who seems to be forgotten by every one as soon as he leaves."

"Oh?"

"Hey, Rai? Fuu? Do you remember last year's struggle champion?" Seifer asked.

"Huh? Yeah, it was some kid." Fuu said.

"He only got in because the tournament got rained on and had to be delayed." Rai said.

"Annoying."

"Short kid. Spiky hair. Fought like a devil from hell."

The group fell silent.

Vivi hesitantly spoke. "Does…anyone else… think that that guy looked a bit like Roxas?"

"I've already spoken with those three troublemakers." Seifer said. "Guy's name was 'Sora,' I didn't catch a last name. He's not from around here either. And seems to come and go as he pleases with no one the wiser."

"Where would we find this guy?" the detective asked.

"No idea. And the kids don't, either."

"And you're certain of that?"

"Pretty sure. Roxas was their friend, they want him back more than anyone. They may have been hesitant to come forward with information, but I don't think that they were withholding anything. Have you talked to the kid's neighbors?"

"Mrs. Wright already gave her statement."

"Hmmm." Seifer was feeling edgy again. This was another dead end, and was getting them nowhere.

"What are we going to do about all this?" Seifer asked.

"We already have officers combing through his former residence. And missing person's posters are being printed up as we speak."

"Anything else?"

The mans sighed. "To be honest, it doesn't look good. Statistically, the odds of finding him alive after all this time are slim. Add to the fact that we have no suspects, or even a real clue of foul play? This is going to take a lot of luck."

"What about the mansion?"

"What about it?" the detective asked, knowing exactly what mansion was The Mansion. "We've got the owner on the phone, and at this point we'll be lucky if no one gets in trouble for breaking and entering."

"It is the most secluded place in town. And those kids were crawling all over it right before he disappeared."

"Maybe. But we still need to start in more easily accessible places."

The next day, the three friends were up with the sun, and sat glumly at the top of the clock tower, shuddering against the wind that wrapped around them in February's chill. Hayner stared with contempt at the people scurrying around on the ground.

"We're never going to find him, are we?" Olette said softly.

Hayner just harrumphed, and Pence shook his head sadly.

"Sora could help us." Pence said. "Where ever he is, he would be able to help."

"But he's not here. Forget about him. We'll need to do this on our own." Hayner said

"But we've got the entire town helping us search." Said Olette. "Hey, look, there's Seifer." She pointed down the long drop to the ground.

Down below, Seifer and the rest of the disciplinary committee craned their necks to see the three up on the tower.

"How on Earth do they get up there?" Seifer wondered aloud. Everyone else just shrugged.

"That guy really pisses me off." Hayner said suddenly. He shook his fist at the ant-sized people.

"So what else is new?" said Pence.

"We're at a standstill." Olette rationalized. "What could we be doing that we're not?"

"We should get inside that mansion." Pence answered.

"Bah. There's nothing there but junk."

"Only on the upper levels." Pecnce defended his ideas. "That lab in the basement had a lot of really good stuff. If I can find some way to contact Sora…"

"Why does it always come back to that guy?" Hayner said angrily.

"Because he's involved in ways we can't imagine." Olette said. "Because he has experience looking for people who are hopelessly lost. Because he deals with weird shit like this all the time."

Down on the ground, the tiny figures of Seifer and his gang appeared to be causing some kind of scene.

"How are we supposed to get them down here?" Rai asked as he jumped up and down and waved at them.

"Dunno. Just try and get their attention. They'll figure it out." Seifer said, half-heartedly waving his arms.

"What is that moron doing?" Pence wondered.

"Maybe he's trying to catch something." Olette said. "Catch the pretty birdies, Rai." She cooed. "Catch the pretty birdies."

"Doofus doesn't realize they're not going to come down a play." Hayner said.

"Aww, don't pick on him." Pence chastised. "It's not his fault he's missing a chromosome."

"They're not coming down." Fuu observed.

"We'll just have to try harder." Vivi joined in in jumping up and down.

"Well will you look at that." Hayner pointed out. "Looks like stupidity is contagious."

"Maybe they're, I dunno, stepping on bugs or something." Pence said.

"Eww. That's an awful lot of bugs." Olette was sickened.

"Hey, I just thought of something." Hayner said. "When Kairi showed up, she just appeared out of nowhere."

"Yeah. What of it?"

"Well, when Sora would visit, he always came from somewhere else. Like he was just visiting from out of town."

"And?"

"Sora seemed really surprised that Kairi had just shown up like that. Like that wasn't a normal way to travel. So…"

"So?"

"So maybe Sora had some other way of getting around. Not the train, or something like a car, but some machine or magical carpet or something that would get him around to the different he would visit."

"Hmm." Pence pondered. "That would make sense. Especially if it was a combination of the two, which would explain why nobody in a space shuttle has ever gotten to any other world like our own."

"Yeah. But more importantly, maybe somewhere out there is some leftovers of how he was getting around, some clue as to how him and all those strange people were getting into our world."

"But where would we look?" Olette asked.

Hayner was very disappointed to once again find that there was nothing down this lead.

"Don't look so glum." Pence patted him on the back. "It was a good idea. I'm sure it'll be of some help once we figure out how to use it."

"I still think that the best place to start searching would be in that mansion. Their technology was much the same, so they have to have some sort of inter-world communication device."

"THE GHOST TRAIN!" Hayner shouted suddenly. Pence and Olette jumped at his voice.

"Don't do that!" Olette slapped his shoulder. "You nearly gave me a heart attack, and, what's worse, I nearly fell off!"

"Sorry." Hayner muttered. "But think about. We saw with our own eyes, Sora and Goofy and Donald getting on that thing. We know it exists. We know it leads to somewhere we've never been. And we know that where ever it is that it goes, you can get to other worlds from there, because Sora had to get his transportation from somewhere."

"Hey! That's an even better idea!" Pence exclaimed.

"And it's actually something we can do!" Olette said excitedly.

"Bua-ha-ha-ha! And were actually _at_ the train station!" Hayner looked as if a great load had been taken off his shoulders.

The three of them stared down at the people on the ground. Seifer and all of his gang were bouncing up and down, and their voices carried softly over the distance. More people had joined in, and no less than a dozen individuals were, well, 'stomping bugs.'

"Let's stay up here for a little while longer." Olette said shakily.

"Sounds like a plan." Hayner said.

**If anyone has anymore questions (or comments), then go ahead and review.**


	3. Chapter 3

For several days, Hayner, Pence and Olette watched steadily for the ghost train.

"It's the best chance we've got." Pence said. "No other angle makes as much sense."

"Do you really think that Roxas is out there somewhere?" Olette said whimsically. "Somewhere, on another world, happy without us?"

Once the initial confusion and frustration had passed over, a plague of guilt and blame started to spread. Had Roxas abandoned them? Or did he feel that they had abandoned him by forgetting? On one hand, if he had been kidnapped and forced to leave against his will, then they all were guilty of failing him as friends, for not even trying to come to his aid sooner. On the other hand, what if he had simply moved on to bigger and better things?

Which was worse: the idea of him struggling in some distant land in need of their help, or the idea that he no longer needed, or wanted, any of them?

The entire town was now on alert for any suspicious behavior. Sure, Roxas had been targeted specifically, but what if someone else became a target? People weren't taking any chances, and if not for their already adept authority-avoiding skills, the trio would have never been able to keep such an alert watch on the comings and goings of the trains. Not that their behavior went unnoticed.

"Do you suppose they've given up on their little friend?" Fuu wondered. She would have expected them all to be continuing to comb the area, or at least try to, and to start getting in the way of the real search effort. Hayner, at least, should have thrown a fit by now, and yet, all the adults who were supposed to be keeping an eye on them remained un-mauled. He sat there with his two little friends in front of the train station, apparently very interested in the printouts of the schedules.

"May be they're thinking of looking in other towns. You know, going from train to train showing pictures or something?" Vivi said.

Seifer just snorted. He had a gut feeling that those brats were up to trouble again. Or may be that was sour-tummy. Sometimes it was hard to tell.

For the most part people left the three kids alone. No one bothered to ask them why they had moved their usual meeting place from on top of the station to down inside it. That gave them all time to consider theories on how to summon and get aboard the ghost train.

"Maybe it arrives only for certain people. If that's the case, then we'll never find it, because we're not anybody special. But, if it's a matter of knowing a certain code or hand shake or having a certain item, then we're almost equally screwed, because we have no idea what that may be." Pence attacked the problem logically.

"We've got to believe that something's going to get us on there." Olette said " 'Can't never could,' we've got to stay positive." But the fact that they were playing the waiting game got on all their nerves. They set up watch, someone there at all times, while the other two searched of clues, and attended school and such. Their parents didn't like this too much, so they all knew they had to hurry. Pence and Olette spent an entire afternoon staring over Sunset Hill, trying to spot a train with no driver. And Hayner broke into the mansion one night to see what he could find.

"It was a wasted trip." He confided to them. "I don't know anything about computers or magic or anything. I could have been sitting on our ticket to where ever, and never even known."

"I don't think that we'll find the pass to the ghost train in the mansion." Said Pence. "Roxas never went in there. Sora did, but he didn't summon the train on his own. He needed the help of that midget in the black cloak."

Hayner looked struck. Pence didn't think that he would have taken the dismissal of that particular plot so harshly.

"Something wrong?" Pence asked.

"No. Maybe. I need to see something." Hayner was definitely distracted.

It took an exercise of Olette's pick-pocketing skills to get Hayner to calm down. He demanded a copy of the police report on Roxas, and she dutifully began targeting adults with papers in their hands to get him one. Six hours, a list of volunteers, a couple of maps, some badly written poetry, a stack of restaurant menus and a dirty magazine later, Hayner triumphantly presented his amazing revelation.

"Look at what he's wearing." Hayner said. "You can't see all of it, because it doesn't go below his chest, but you can see around his shoulders and front. Remember the midget? He had on this black-zippered-hoodie thing."

"It's the same." Olette gasped. "It's that same tacky cloak. Right down to the zipper-pulls."

"It could be a coincidence." Pence pointed out. "It's not like any of us own all custom made clothes, and we've all probably gone, 'hey, I have that same shirt' at one time or another."

"Oh. Right." Olette sounded disappointed, but Hayner remained thoughtful.

"Hey, guys?"

"Yeah?"

"Why is this picture here?"

"Uhh…because it's a mugshot? Because someone put it there? What kind of answer are you looking for?"

"Why is this the only other picture of Roxas that we have? I mean, besides that one that has all of us? When those…things…started stealing photos, we got them all back, but this one wasn't in there. And why can't we find any of those photo's now? Did those things come back for them?"

Nobody had any answers. They sat on the benches in the train station, doing homework and listening to Pence's radio until late into the evening.

Seifer was the one who interrupted them. He looked dogged down, a little tired, but mostly annoyed, pent up, like an animal in a cage. He and his followers easily surrounded the trio, who had their backs to a wall.

"I've put up with a lot of shit from you three." He started to talk after staring down Hayner. "Lord knows your shenanigans have driven me up a wall in the past. Time and time again I've been astounded by the stupidity and childishness of your actions."

The other three members of the committee were a little amazed with what their boss was getting away with. Usually one (coughHaynercough) or more of them would have been on their feet hurling insults back by now.

"At this point, I'm reminded of that old saying 'silence is more suspicious than noise.' And so here I am, finding out what this silence is all about."

Hayner offhandedly made a very rude suggestion. Seifer didn't care.

"Somebody's going to tell me what's going on, or I'm going to put a stop to this right now."

"Homework." Pence said, brandishing a page of math problems. "There's no crime in that."

"Ah, but you don't need to be doing that here."

"Don't need to. Want to. And there's nothing you can do to stop us. We haven't been doing anything wrong." Hayner sneered.

"Oh, but I can. Your parents have told me that you've all been out late recently. So not only can I drag you over to them, but I can have you all in community service for breaking curfew. So either you tell me what you've been doing here, or you're not going to have any free time for a looong while."

"Meh."

"**_CENSORED_** you."

"You wouldn't believe us if you told you."

It was time for a different approach. "Going somewhere? Planning a trip?" he eyed the schedule printout that was scribbled on.

"It doesn't matter."

"It'll matter to your parents."

"Which won't matter to us."

Hayner and Seifer were in a staredown again.

"Acting bull headed won't bring him back." Seifer said softly.

Hayner maintained eye contact, but his heart wasn't in it. On either side of him, Pence and Olette gathered up their things. A hand on Hayner's shoulder brought him out of the staring contest, and the three kids filed out of the station, brushing past Vivi.

Behind them, Seifer was royally pissed off. "Dammit." He said. "Why can't those three just let us in on what they know!"

"I thought you said that they wouldn't with hold information." Fuu pointed out.

"That was before. I was certain they had told us all they knew. But now…" he sighed and slumped "either they've found something new, or they've figured out something."

"I don't see why you're so surprised." Vivi said. "They knew him best. And it's not like they trust us. We're probably the last place they'd go for help."

"But where would they go, if not us or the police or their parents?" Fuu wanted to know.

"Each other. They trust each other. That's how a street punk, a rich kid, and a fat geek can be such good friends." Vivi, as usual, was more insightful than the others.

"What do you suppose she meant by 'you wouldn't believe us if we told you?'"

Vivi thought for a minute, and then shared his thoughts. "It's probably something weird, like the word thief or those funny white attackers. Something that, under normal circumstances, no one in their right mind would believe."

"Which means, in this case, it's all the more likely to be true." Seifer pointed out. "and important."

"This is getting us nowhere." Hayner cried. "We need a signal or a key or a name or _something_ to get that train here."

"I hate to say it." Pence said. "But it may be time to have another look inside the mansion."

"Are you serious?" Olette asked "I mean, we've gotten in trouble before, but we've never done anything really illegal. What if we get caught?"

"The only way they can catch us is to come inside with us. And the moment anyone with any sort of authority sees what's inside that basement, they'll be more interested in what sort of freaky weird shit they were doing down there than any little thing we may be charged with." Hayner was firm in his resolve. He had had a feeling that it would come to this.

"I didn't get to have a very good look around last time we were in there." Pence said. "But it looks like we're out of options. Besides, if we don't do it, no one else is going to."

"I guess that's true." Olette said.

"It'll be okay." Pence said. "No one's going to be around, and we'll go in the middle of the day, so that no one will even notice us missing."

**Bear with me. This is about to get good.**


	4. Chapter 4

**Kinda a short chapter, but I'll make up for it in the next one.**

Going in the middle of the day was probably the most ingenious plan that Pence had ever come up with. The day was for planning, and the night was for carrying out those plans, so it had been since the dawn of mischief. But now they had an almost sure-fire way of succeeding; during the daytime, almost everyone seemed simply too busy to keep track of them.

Dodging Seifer and his gang was an average experience, no harder or easier than usual, nothing out of the ordinary. Unknown to the kids, Seifer was kicking himself for not confiscating that map when he had the chance.

"Maybe I can get it from them later. Say it's for the search or something." He thought. But first he'd have to find them.

Hayner had plotted out their pathway the previous night. They met at the Usual Spot, and then they took the tunnels, and then the rooftops. Lying in wait on top of some restaurant until the coast was clear to make a dash for the hole in the wall, he outlined the rest of the plan.

"There might have been someone posted there to keep us out, but we've all been off being suspicious elsewhere for quite some time, and the adults are all understaffed, so they probably didn't bother to post anyone yet."

"All the more reason to make this trip count." Olette said, peering over the edge of the roof. "If we get caught before we find anything good, we may not get back inside."

"From this angle, our biggest problem is the people in the restaurant. If they see us acting weird, and with everyone on high alert, they may just talk to the wrong people." Hayner continued.

"The best way to do this is to hide in plain sight." Pence said. "The key here is to not look suspicious, or like we're up to something."

"Not gonna happen." Hayner said. "The call went out yesterday. Turns out our parents really were just that cheesed at us for breaking curfew all week. They got together to talk about this 'problem,' and then went to the police, who then issued a bulletin asking people to keep an eye out for us."

"What? Why didn't anyone say anything?" Olette gasped.

"Duh. Because we got in late last night, and probably were all standoffish. I know I was. And then we left at the crack of dawn this morning." Pence told her.

"It's the curse of living in a small town." Hayner said. "And of being easily recognizable. And desirable. And good-looking."

The usual good-humored attempts to deflate Hayner's big head were passed around.

"All right. Here's how we're going to do this." Hayner said to his friends. "We're going to keep an eye out for the train, and we're going to look for one that's passing by and has as few passengers as possible. Preferably none."

Olette and Pence nodded.

"Then we're going to make the jump from off this roof to the top of the train, and from the train to the ground on the far side. The driver won't see us because he has to keep his eyes on the road, and no one in the restaurant will see us, first because the train will be in the way, and then because we'll be too far away to catch their attention from their meal."

It was a good plan. But easier said than done. Neither Olette nor Pence were much of a jumper. Still, as the day rolled on, they found a train in the slow hours that suited their needs, and though Olette twisted her ankle a little, she still made it to the hole in the wall with the guys.

"Do you think anyone saw us?" She wondered.

"No. And don't look back. You might be seen."

The gravity of what they were about to do was hard to keep off during the boring walk through the woods. Action was a lot more unnerving that just sitting and waiting for something to happen. Conversation was stressed, tense. Olette shrieked when an animal of some kind dashed out across their path and into the bushes on the other side. Hayner was irritable, which wouldn't have surprised any of the other town residents, but was nonetheless an unusual experience for his friends. Pence said little the entire trip, lapsing into the quiet boy he became when separated from his buddies.

The gate to the mansion was a welcome sight, as it signaled the end of this rainy-day parade. They tiptoed up to the building, and Hayner began poking around for the things he had used to break in a few nights ago. With a thick log to boost them up, and some tools to gently pry into a low window, the three slid silently into the menaced inside of the otherwise beautiful house. Here, their nerves go the better of them, and the three of them bounced as quickly as they could around the rubble and over to the second story, making as little noise as possible. The creaking of the door to the room with the secret passage was like thunder in their ears, they were all sure that it could be heard from at least the next town over.

The gaping entry into the basement was still open, and still just as forbidding as always. Hearts pounding and mysteriously short of breath, they walked shoulder to shoulder down the stairs.

Pence pensively typed in 'sea-salt icecream.'

The computer booted up with the expected flicker and whirr. Hayner and Olette loafed around the room, peering into corners in the dim light from the computer screens.

They poked around in the drawers and cabinets, shifted around books and diagrams, and dusted off unidentified pieces of machinery. But mostly they waited. And waited. And waited some more.

They waited patiently for Pence, who had the more interesting, and more frustrating, job. He knew from before that this computer was a real piece of work, designed differently and running differently from anything that people from this world used. Still, with a little trial and error, he could navigate its contents.

What he found was aggravating, confusing, and a little creepy. Whoever it was that made this thing was some sort of mad voyeur. There was information on everybody, from speech patterns to bodily functions. The programmer had been spying on the entire town, seemed like. But there were inconsistencies. There were two sets of data for everything. And while one set of data did influence the other, the differences between the two remained, deliberately, and in the most bizarre ways. Pence traced these differences, used them as markers for his search. As he came closer to the truth, his breath hitched, he started thinking in circles. This _could not_ be happening.

Finally, he had to pull away. The implications of what was going on were astounding.

Hayner and Olette were at his side, soothing him until he found the strength to tell them of his discovery. With his back hunched over and his face in his hands, he tried to convey the horror of the data within the computer.

"We know of the _other_ traverse town." He said. "Sora went there. I opened the gate for him. We all remember that."

Nods and 'uh-huh's' from the others.

Pence was having trouble breathing, having trouble spitting it out.

"The guy who made this made a fake Twilight Town by spying on the real one. This computer system continues to watch us, to watch the entire town, even in his absence. It automatically updates the fake town with the weather, the actions of all the people, the patterns of our daily lives. But it also adds in some differences. You can look and see how the towns are different.

Pence wiped off sweat that had accumulated on his forehead and around his neck, even in the cold of the metallic room. "Roxas is in there." He said.

"He is?" Hayner said, excitement slipping into his voice, and Olette gave a little squeal of joy. "He's in there now? Let's go get him!"

"No. No. He's not in there now." Pence hated disappointing them like this. "I can't find where he is now. But there's data in there that shows us exactly where he _was_, from entry to exit."

"So we can find him?"

"No. Because you can't find what does not exist."

**Like I said, short. But the next one will be much longer.**


	5. Chapter 5

**I'm actually rather pleased with this chapter- it just kept going and going and going. And it was a lot of fun to write. Enjoy!**

"It's why there was next to no physical evidence about Roxas." Pence told them. He showed them on the computer what he was talking about. "Sure, he went to school with us. He had a home. He must've had about a bajillion pictures with him in it. But no one could ever find any of those things, because they only ever existed in the Fake Twilight Town. We all remember him, but we _shouldn't_, because we technically never met him in the first place."

"Take a look at this." Pence brought up another data pack. Hayner and Olette immediately recognized it, from the day that the pictures went missing.

"We all thought that there was some great big magic trick involved in stealing the word 'photo,' in making it so that no one could say that word. But there wasn't. It was a bit of system sabotage, someone got into the program and deleted the word 'photo' from the encyclopedia set that all the fake people in the fake town use and need to feed them their vocabulary. That's all it was."

"Remember right before he disappeared? He asked us 'I fell off the station building yesterday, didn't I?"

Pence activated a video feed. They stared at themselves, plus Roxas, all in their summer clothes. The morning's greeting's passed back and fourth, and eventually Roxas, looking confused, asked the question. They remembered their responses, 'no way,' 'you wouldn't be here if you did,' etc, etc, and the exact same words came from the lips of the recordings.

"Just one of the many weird things he asked us before he was gone." Hayner mumbled.

"It wasn't unwarranted." Pence said, and he rewound the recording. It sped past the morning, the previous night, and into the previous afternoon. Pence started the recording.

The four of them were atop the station building, laughing and chatting happily. They were pleased with how the day had gone, and were cheerfully making plans for tomorrow. Ice cream was passed around. Roxas stood. Slipped. Teetered. And fell.

All three people watching the computer screen stood silent as their friend plummeted to certain death. But halfway down, the picture cut out, fading into static. Various computer pop-up notices whizzed by, and the next scene was Roxas, asleep in his bed at home.

"He fell." Pence stated. "but the program wouldn't let him die, so it intervened. Rearranged everyone to make it like it had never happened."

Neither of the other two said anything for a while. Pence respected their right to be royally freaked out by all of this.

"So…" Olette stopped, and went back to staring at her shoes. Moments passed before she could suck up the courage to ask "What does all this mean?"

"It means…" Pence had to bolster his own courage to say it. "It means that we can call off the search. Roxas isn't missing. He just never existed in the first place."

"DON'T SAY THAT!" Hayner shouted.

"Hayner…" Pence tried to calm him down. "Roxas was just a computer program."

"HE IS NOT!"

"He isn't real…"

"THAT'S A LIE!" Hayner had tears streaming down his face, oddly out of place with the look of absolute rage that was also there.

"_He_ was the lie. He was just some twisted experiment."

"It's…not…true…" Hayner was on his knees, gripping the edge of the computer table with his trembling fingers. He stared hopelessly up at the data displayed before him. Pence, still in the chair, placed one hand on Hayner's shoulder. On the other side of him, Olette was also crying.

Hayner turned away from the many computer monitors, and buried his face against his knuckles. "The person who made this was playing with our lives. He's the one to blame." Pence told him.

"Where did he go?" Hayner whispered.

"I don't know. But I can look."

"Do it."

Olette took charge of Hayner, making him sit down on a metal box, and sitting about a foot away, knowing, from years of experience, that Hayner wasn't one to cuddle when he was upset. She waited until he was ready to talk, or until he looked ready to listen, whatever came first.

Pence tried his best to stay strong for his friends. Try as he might, he couldn't figure out a reason for why all of a sudden the two worlds seemed to be merging. But the important thing would be to find the one who did this. He tirelessly searched, while behind him, Hayner regained his composure, and once again began insisting that Roxas had to have been real.

"What about our memories?"

"Just data from the other world."

"What about that picture?"

"A creation. Like that bag that I made."

"What about…" He stopped, eyes wide in amazement. He stripped off his backpack and threw it down, unmindful of the school books in side. He dropped to his knees and tore it open pulling out a familiar plain manila envelope.

"What about _this_ picture?" Hayner asked. Pence swirled the chair around to look at them. He had forgotten about the police report.

"Why do we remember what's supposed to be fake, and don't remember what's probably real?"

"The data doesn't go back that far." Pence informed them. "The police report is dated three months before even the very earliest files were created."

Hayner looked ready to collapse again. "Another dead end." He moaned.

"No. It's not. It's probably the best clue we've had so far." Pence pointed out. "If this file predated any of this scientist guy's interference, then it's almost certainly authentic. He might have not even known it existed."

"Then why didn't anyone remember it?" Olette asked. "Who else could have erased everyone's memories like that?"

"Good point. I guess that was probably him."

"Was there any recording's of him at all?" Hayner asked.

"I don't think so."

"Check anyways."

"If you insist."

Pence stared up a search for related video recordings and data files. He went back to searching for the creator of this system. The other two stood around, feeling weird about leaving all of the work to someone else. They were a team, they shared things like chores and responsibility. Olette pulled some candy bars from her own bag and handing them around.

"Hey, guys? I've been thinking." She said, staring at her un-wrapped chocolate but not biting. "What's the point of all this?"

"What? Finding Roxas isn't a good enough reason for you?" Hayner was being a bit snippy.

"No, not that. I really want to get to the bottom of this, too. But what was the point of all of _this_? I mean, creating a virtual reality and making an almost perfect copy of the town is pretty impressive and all, but what's the point? It's not helping anyone, it's not like it was supposed to make money or anything. Why put all the time and effort into building such a useless, complicated system?"

"Hmm." Hayner couldn't think of a reason. "I guess we'll just have to ask him when we find him."

"I'm not sure we'll have too much luck. No one's been on this system for a real long time. This is the first time it's been used since we were here with Sora, and before that it hadn't been used for several months. Whoever made this is long gone." Pence informed them.

"But where did they go?" Hayner wanted to know. "From the looks of all of this, he left kinda like Roxas and Sora. No trace, no sign, no clue.

"Hmm." Pence started a new search. "There isn't any sort of vehicle registered, or any sort of cosmic telephone or something."

"I doubt he would have bothered to put that in his computer." Olette said. "How many people put notices on their laptops on what they drive, what their license numbers are, or where they're parked?"

"True. Why don't you two look around and see if you can find where he parked his spaceship?"

"What makes you think it would be here?" Hayner asked. "If the dude is gone, he probably left in his wagon."

"Jus look around. See if there is any place he could have kept it."

"Okay."

With something they could finally do, Hayner and Olette started looking around again. There was precious little they hadn't already explored, but they gave all the hallways and broom closets a good look over anyways. With out them to distract him, Pence did his best not to disappoint. He finally got the user data on screen, and the computer was registered as belonging to someone named 'Diz,' which was a strange name, but then again, he did come from another world. No references were made to any sort of transportation, but a highly encrypted personal log was found. It required no less than seven different passwords, and Pence didn't trust his hacking skills on such an unfamiliar piece of technology. He went back to pouring over the data collected on the town, as he had gotten the idea of using all of this to figure out how to find the ghost train. This, and other data, was set aside for when the other two got back.

Hayner and Olette stuck close as they moved to some of the creepier places of the secret basement. They skirted around those freakish flower-coffin-bed things, the ones that Sora had pointed out as being snares that kept you in an enchanted sleep. There really wasn't much around. As much as they would like to find a teleportation chamber or a second flying car, they couldn't identify many of the machines, and so could not truly say what they did and did not find.

"It's not like any one of us would be able to use it, anyway. Pence is good with computers, but he doesn't know their high-tech stuff. And he can't drive. I'm the only one of us that has ever driven, and there's no way I'd be able to drive a flying saucer."

"We'll think of something." Olette said softly, staring at a wall.

"Hey, what's eatin' you? You seem kinda out of it."

"Just thinking."

"About him?"

"Who else?"

Hayner seated himself on some steps. "I want to know where he is. Is he okay? What _really_ happened to him?"

"But don't you see?" Olette cried, suddenly releasing all that she had been keeping inside. "He has no reason to care about us! He could be free as a bird somewhere, and he'll never have a reason to come back here! We were never really friends! We were never really _anything_ to him, we're just some random strangers who have a bunch of fake memories of stuff that never happened!"

"Whoa, whoa there." Deciding that it was time to head back, he put an arm around her and walked her down the halls. "Right now, I think we're just trying to figure out exactly what was going on here. Roxas was involved. Roxas'll probably want to know all of this, too. And we may not have actually met him, but our program thingies got along real well with his program thingy, we'll probably all get along real well. You'll see. It'll be like having a new friend that's just like an old friend."

Olette didn't look like she was buying this.

"Good. You're back." Pence looked excited. "Come see this." He pulled up another video file. "This one's dated about a week before the fake Twilight Town got up and running. It's authentic, as far as I can tell, and it played a part in some plan of the programmer's that involved Roxas." He hit the button to play.

_It was raining. The entire town was inside, probably huddled in front of warm drinks and wrapped in quilts. It was the sort of night that whistled outside the windows and made people appreciate thick socks. _

_In the sand-lot, Roxas knelt in the mud. The tail of his black cloak splayed around his feet, and his arms hung limply by his side. His hood was down, and water streaked down his face, though even this downpour could not pull down the golden spikes of hair. He said nothing, just stared up at the sky as water attacked him from above. _

_"You know, most people are smart enough to get in out of the rain." Sloppy footfalls came from the steps._

Hayner stared as himself walked in from the direction of the Usual Place. He didn't remember any of this.

_"Wassa matta? Too busy being goth that you forgot that no one likes an attention whore?" The boy with the umbrella asked. The chin of the kneeling blond dropped, and he eyed this intruder._

_"I like the rain." He said._

_"Good backdrop for an angsty crying fit?" Hayner joked._

_"He can't follow me here. And he wouldn't be able to set any more fires."_

_That shut him up. A few more steps around gave him a good look at this stranger's face._

_"Hey." Hayner said. "Do I know you from somewhere? Have we met before?" he was puzzled. Why was this guy so familiar?_

_"Once. Or twice. I've lost track of how many times we've met. But always, always I am punished for it, and always, they have her steal your memories so that you do not endanger our cause._

_Hayner was visibly surprised. "Huh? What?" He struggled to make sense of what had been said._

_Roxas didn't give him that chance. "So tell me, Hayner, how have you been? I haven't had time to skateboard since the last time I was here, but I would still like to know if you have been practicing that twirling stunt I showed you."_

_"Hey!" Hayner protested. "You didn't show me the Tornado Slide!"_

_"Really?" Roxas smiled. "And who did? Or do you believe that you invented that on your own?"_

_"I…you…"Hayner was getting a dangerous gleam in his eye. He didn't like it when people deliberately confused him, or when they would be smug in the knowledge that they knew something that he didn't._

_"You know, it's funny." Roxas said. "I could almost say that she's doing this deliberately. She's capable of erasing everything, of truly voiding my time here. But the last few time's I've disobeyed, she's left pieces behind. Not my face, not my voice, not my name, but my actions are remembered…like I've left fingerprints on your lives." He stood. "I can't think of a reason she would do such a thing. It's really quite the lovely gift. I know she daren't defy the Superior's orders directly, but it's nice to know that she is capable of doing something to spite him. It's nice to know that she may someday be willing to help me." He stopped for a minute, giving Hayner that familiar 'hey, guess what' look that sent the other boy into a fit of déjà vu. "And I guess that it's also nice to know that Xemnas is capable of overlooking things, of screwing up. If he was as perfect as he pretends, he would be awful hard for me to kill."_

_Hayner's eyes grew wide. "Kill? You're planning to kill someone?" He took a step back. _

_"Not planning, per se." Roxas said, looking a little sad. "But I have a feeling that I'll have to. Especially with the way things are now. You, of all people, should understand. What with everything with your step-dad and all."_

_"What?" Hayner was again surprised, and then his eyes narrowed. "How do you know about that?"_

_"You told me."_

_"I only told my friends."_

_"Yes. Pence, Olette,…and me."_

_"No. Not you. You're just some guy."_

_"A guy who was trusted enough to be there when you told them what was going on."_

_Hayner snorted. "Yeah. So, like, I sat you down in my backyard, some _**nobody**_, and told you all about something that it had taken weeks just to suck up the guts to tell my best friends about."_

_Roxas pulled his hood up, and the cut of it hid his face very well. "It wasn't in your backyard. It was in the tunnel apex."_

_Hayner looked a little miffed that this guy had passed that particular test. "And I don't remember you being there… why?"_

_"You won't believe it." Roxas murmered. "You never do when I tell you about what that witch can do to people's memories. You always just snort and make references to alien brain-snatchers."_

_Hayner didn't have much more surprise left in him. How had this guy known that that was what he was thinking?_

_"How much did she leave in, I wonder?" Roxas asked the sky. "Do you remember going out to buy hotdogs with money that none of you three produced? Do you remember why you bought four instead of three? Do you remember what we did afterwards?"_

_"We scared him." Hayner said. "We scared him so that that bastard would never hit my little brother again."_

_"No, **I** scared him. I scared him right in front of all of you. Do you remember what it was like, seeing what I could do? Do you remember laughing about it after wards?"_

_Hayner now looked confused as he tried to bring up memories that were in complete. "What is going on?" he eventually demanded. "Who are you?"_

_"I wish I could tell you." The hooded Roxas said. "And really, I could. But that would just make them even more angry, and I don't want that. Besides," he started to walk away. "they'll just make you forget again. So why bother?"_

_"Because it wasn't enough!" Hayner grabbed the back of the cloak. "That bastard forgot just as soon as it was over, and I think he need's another dose!"_

_Roxas turned to him. "Unfortunately, Hayner, the effect would probably still be the same."_

_"Don't go Roxas!" Hayner implored. "Don't-"_

_"You-, you said-!" one gloved hand flew to his mouth, or at least where his mouth would be behind the collar of the hood. "This is bad. I need to go."_

_Black whisps, barely distinguishable from the deep night in the dim light of the street lamps, circled around him. The rain seemed to bend above his head, like a glass dome surrounded him to turn it aside. Hayner drew back, or perhaps he was pushed by this weather-bending force._

_"I am sorry." Roxas said as he was further obscured. "Or at least I would be, if I had a heart."_

_"Roxas!" Hayner cried "_**Roxas**_!" He tried to reach him through the black ripples but they dispersed, and the boy was gone from inside them. _

_"Roxas." Hayner said quietly. "That was his name. Ro- aaaaagh." Hayner's hand's flew to his head, and he staggered as he moaned in pain. _

_"It's-it's because-ergh-he's a…" he fell to the ground, sinking into the mud. "Nohbumble…" he mumbled a little before he faded completely. _

Silence reigned.

"Umm…yeah, uh, that's kinda important in some way, I'm sure of it." Pence stammered. "I found some other stuff, too."

"What the _hell_ was that?" Hayner shouted.

"That appeared to be you, and Roxas, talking, and, well, I'm assuming that epileptic fit you had there at the end would be that memory witch he was talking about messing with your noggin." Pence told him.

Hayner was having trouble forming coherent sentences.

"What else did you find?" Olette asked.

"Well, I got the idea to try and use this spy program to figure out how the heck to get the ghost train here. But I didn't find anything useful. Then I pulled out the video file of when Kairi appeared out of nowhere, but unless we figure out how to summon pools of darkness around ourselves, then that option is a dead end, too, especially since Kairi herself didn't know how she got here, and Sora never made any indication that he was familiar with that sort of thing either."

"So we're back where we started." Olette said.

"Kinda, yeah." He knew that everyone was disappointed, just like him. "But look at the bright side. We found out a whole lot of stuff. And I'm sure there's more in here. I just need to find it."

"And what will that take?" Hayner asked.

"Umm…well judging by the sheer amount of data, and my inexperience in navigating the system, though I am getting better, I'd say…" he thought for a bit. "About a month or three. And that's if I'm working full-time."

Hayner groaned. How he hated all these dead ends!

"We do have options, however." Pence said. "any files I'm not searching through manually, we can start a search program in, that should be able to pull out anything that meets certain criteria. And we don't have to be here for that to work. We can start a broad search, and let it run while we're in school or something. That should speed things up, especially since the hard drive is so full, it doesn't have enough memory to do anything with any real amount of speed, so this stuff will take a long time."

"Well…I guess that sounds okay. But wait, how are we supposed to be getting here all the time? I though people were going to be watching us." Olette saw some flaws in that particular plan.

"Yeah." Said Hayner. "and we're not even supposed to be here. We'll eventually get caught. And then we'll never get back here."

"Uh, lemme think. We could tell other people." Pence suggested. "You know, be all upfront about it. Then they'll have to help us, and they, well, I guess they'd probably try and get in our way, wouldn't they?"

"Yeah. People aren't going to react well when they find out about all of this spying and stuff." Hayner pointed out.

"I can up the processing speed by shutting down unnecessary functions." Said Pence. "That should help us get as much done as possible before someone stops us. But…"

"But?"

"The function that is using the most memory and bandwidth is the running of the 'fake Twilight Town.'"

"So? Shutting it down would be like turning off a video game, right?" Hayner asked. "It should all be there when we get back."

"Yes, that's true. But the program startup sequence is under a password. If I turn it off, I won't be able to turn it back on without help. Plus the program is going to want to automatically update itself if we do ever turn it back on, which is going to tie up the computer for a long time."

"So?" said Olette. "We'll just keep it off. It's not like anyone really needs a fake town anyway."

"Okay." Pence turned back to the computer. "Just give me a few moments."

Pence had the simulation turned off in five minutes flat, and then started off some searches for any thing that contained certain keywords, like 'Roxas,' 'Diz,' 'black cloak.' 'Sora,' etc, ect. He was rising from his seat when a notice popped up, a signal that one of his search criteria had found its first mark.

"Hmm." He sat back down and started typing again.

"Aw, just leave it. We need to be getting back, we don't have time for this."

A small gasp from Pence brought Hayner and Olette over to see what the computer had found.

The live video feed was playing, showing a scene from somewhere in the train station. A very, very old man was standing on the platform, glaring at everything. Behind him, the doors to a train slid shut.

A train.

The ghost train.

The ghost train was here, and it had brought them a passenger.

**Guess. Just Guess who it is. **


	6. Chapter 6

**Ah, the next installment. Questions answered, Mysteries un-mysified, and all that jazz. **

The three of them had never made such incredible speed from out of the mansion basement, out the gate, through the woods and into town. Halfway through the market district, they slowed and stopped, partially hidden in the shadows.

The old man from the station was standing under a streetlamp, glaring down at a piece of paper. Even from this distance, the three friends recognized one of the flyers that had been circling around since this whole thing began, with Roxas's face pasted over the words 'missing.' The old man seemed to find this both amusing and aggravating at the same time.

Hayner sucked up his guts and stepped out of the darkness. Olette and Pence filed behind him, and one by one nonchalantly strode past the stranger. They only had to get past him to get to the train station, and then all their questions would be answered.

"It is quite impossible for the people of this town to remember this boy." The man said suddenly.

"Keep going." Hayner whispered back at his friends. His own pace became labored but steady, as he fought down the urge to make a run for it. He knew that the other two were still winded and tired from their mad dash here. If they had to make one last sprint, then there was a good chance that he would have to leave them behind. And this was the sort of adventure that one would want company on.

His progress was halted when he walked into a wall, or at least, a really big glass pane. He bounced back, startled, and rubbed his nose as he ran one hand over the invisible barrier. He could see the station plaza just around the corner, almost there…

Olette and Pence found the obstacle most demoralizing. In a matter of seconds, all three of them had their backs pressed against it as the old man advanced on them.

"I rarely leave my tower." He told them. "but when the dual image of the two Twilight Towns faded into one, I knew that this was something that demanded my immediate attention.

Not for the first time, Hayner wished he was the type of guy that could carry a struggle club with him at all times. This old guy was creepy; long beard, big pointy hat, and what appeared to be a dress draped over his body. Freak.

He was right on them, and Olette was trembling. "I'll scream." She said simply, and swallowed hard. She meant it.

The old guy halted, and seemingly, her threat had worked, but he did not leave. His big bushy eyebrows bunched together. "I do not often deal with children, and women even less so. But you misunderstand my intentions. I merely wish to know about the boy in the picture."

Hayner stepped between his friends and the old dude, and behind him, Pence wrapped a comforting arm around Olette. Both glared at the stranger, while Olette was still irrationally afraid. Pence felt behind him with his other arm. The barrier seemed to have faded.

"What is it to you? You're not from around here." Hayner was stalling. Hell if he'd tell this guy anything about Roxas.

"I want to know because that boy belongs here even less than I do." The man started to say, but just then Pence tapped his foot once, twice, thrice, and all three turned and ran, with no barrier to stop them. Beneath their feet, the ground seemed to shift, and they all had trouble keeping their footing. Pence, dragging Olette behind him, fell once, but was quickly hauled up by the other two. If they had had to go any real distance, this would have been the end of their escape for sure, but seeing as it was a matter of meters to the stairs to the station, they made out okay.

The ghost train was still there when they burst into the station, and all breathed a sigh of relief, for their fears of finding it already gone were unfounded. They burst inside, staring wildly out the windows.

Pence was the first one to realize that they needed to get this thing on it's way, but before he could move to act on that, a splash of color rose out of the floor, and it grew until it touched the ceiling. They were trying the doors, desperate to get out, having realized their mistake, when the color faded, and the old man stood in its place.

The old guy sat down at the front of the cabin, facing back at them. "I came here looking for answers, but it seems I'll have to settle for you three instead." He smiled a scary smile. "It's a small gamble, but worth it. After all, you three were in the picture that Sora showed me."

Hayner confronted him. "How do you know S-" and he promptly fell on his butt when the train lurched and started pulling out of the station.

"All in due time." Their kidnapper said.

All three youths had grown up around trains, so the cabin was nothing special. Outside the windows, however, there was a state of wonder such as they had never seen. It was like the sky was made of paint, like there was no ground at all. They watched as their home grew distant, and the train tracks that were held up by nothing were the only solid object in all eternity.

The train moved quickly along. Eventually the novelty of the void and all its colors wore off, and the three sat side-by-side in the back of the train, facing the old guy who made no attempt to talk to them.

Just as this journey was becoming unbearable, it ended. The train stopped at an island in space, not a mile square and possessing one gigantic tower. The old man stepped off, and they followed meekly.

"My name." he said at last, "is Yen Sid, and this," he seemed to glide over to the structure, "is my home."

Once inside, Mr. Sid and the Twilight Town kids were accosted by three dumpy flying women in single-color uniforms. They scolded Mr. Sid for not telling them that he would be bringing back guests, and then started making offers of tea and crumpets, which were politely refused, despite the late hour and the newly-realized hunger. As the fairies hovered off, nobody was fooled into believing that they wouldn't return with food and drink to gently try and pressure people into eating.

Yen Sid led them up stairs, stairs, and more stairs. When they reached the top of his tower, he sat himself at a huge sturdy wooden desk, and bade them sit down as well.

"So," He said. "Tell me what you know of Roxas of Organization Thirteen."

When no one moved to answer, he prompted them some more. "I know that you know Sora, the Keyblade Master. And I know that you helped him invade Darkness in Zero's fake reality. So it stands to reason that you would know why that reality seems to have disappeared."

"I, uh, I turned it off." Pence stammered.

Yen Sid seemed to have only two modes, mildly pissed and angry. He continued to eye the three children with a glowering stare, and Pence hurried to try and justify his actions.

"It was using too much bandwidth and memory, so I had to find a way to work around it." He stammered. "Turning it off seemed like the best option."

Yen Sid raised one hand, silencing Pence. "I care not about the fate of Ansem the Wise's experiment. But I do need to know what it has been doing to the people of Twilight Town in its maker's absence."

"You're talking about all the fake memories." Said Pence.

Yen Sid fixed him in his gaze, his big bushy grey eyebrows sliding together. "What do you know about the fake memories?" he asked.

"I know that, according to the data taken from our town, much of what we remember never really happened. I also know that the things that we remember did take place in the Fake Twilight Town." Pence said calmly.

"Hmm." Went Yen Sid. "And what else have you gleaned from the memory banks of that machine?"

Pence tilted his head. "What do you mean?"

"I mean _what do you know of the Organization_?" Yen Sid rose dramatically, and his voice reached a crescendo. "What do you know of the Nobodies? What do you know of Roxas the Thirteenth?"

Hayner looked up at the man quizzically. "I'd say…pretty close to nothing…"

"It's a very strange system. Unlike any I've ever encountered before." Pence justified. "I'm sure there's more useful stuff in there, I just have to find it."

It was difficult to tell if Yen Sid was pleased. The look of contempt never wavered from his face as he strode around his desk to stand before them.

"To truly understand what is going on," he said loftily, "to really possess the knowledge necessary to remedy the situation, you will need to know the whole truth of what transpired here over the last two-and-a-half years."

"You gonna tell us or just stand there posing?" the words slipped from Hayner's lips before he could stop them. He slapped a hand over his mouth as Yen Sid subjected him to very demoralizing laser vision.

"Perhaps I made a mistake in bringing you here. Perhaps I should return you to your homes, and find some other, more responsible persons to aid me in defusing this situation."

Despite her protests at being called irresponsible, and her fear that they may be dismissed without answers, Olette asked, "what do you need us for?"

"I need you to keep an eye on the people of Twilight Town." Yen Sid told her. "You three were the first to bring this problem to attention, you three will have to be the one's to present a plausible explanation to the townspeople."

"Oh."

"As I was saying, before I was so _rudely_ interrupted," Mr. Sid fixed Hayner in another spiteful glare. "I am prepared to tell you what I know of this in exchange for your cooperation in this endeavor."

None of the three friends made a move, or so much as a peep. Answers were what they had been after all this time. Now if he would just get to the point.

Yen Sid folded his long and bony fingers together, and examined each of them, making sure that they had no more (deliberate, he was sure) interruptions planned. Then, with a breath and a draw, he began.

"I first heard of the Nobodies from a former student of mine, who now rules over the Disney Kingdom. He came to me looking for answers, but I had none for him. In all my years and all my books, we could find no name and no origin for the strange creatures that had shown up in many a world. They were not heartless, they were not golems, they were not anything anyone had ever seen before." Yen Sid paused, and asked them "You do know what a Heartless is, don't you?"

"Beings of darkness and shadow that attack people and steal their hearts" Hayner said.

Satisfied, Yen Sid continued. "This problem was a perplexing one, but it did not come alone. Sometime later I became aware of someone imposing their will on the minds of specific peoples in Twilight Town. The town is important, you see," He once again broke from whatever story he was trying to tell. "because it exists in a sort of gravitational limbo. No other world is so close to the void and the world of darkness, but instead of rotting away or being pulled in, it instead orbits the two, and seems to shine all the brighter. I have spent years studying this phenomenon."

"For quite some time, no one could give us any answers. My investigations into the interlopers in Twilight Town revealed frequent, if irregular, visits. The townspeople somehow mostly forgot about them after they were gone, if they ever noticed them in the first place. One of the few pieces of hard evidence I could find of their presence was the incident that resulted in the police headquarters being burned down." A shared look between all present acknowledged showed that yes, the kids knew that Roxas had been in jail.

"Almost all of our questions were answered when a boy showed up on my doorstep, one sunny day in winter. He came without a gummi-ship, or even on my locomotive, but out of darkness and shadow."

"His Highness the King was absent, seeing how he was still warring with the remaining Heartless and training his new protégé, Riku. I alone took this boy's testimony. It changed the way we look at the heart and how we ourselves are put together."

"Previously, it was believed that, when a person loses their heart to a Heartless, all of what remains behind is what becomes another Heartless. And, since the discovery of Heartless, there has been much argument over the fate and existence of a person's soul. The discovery of Nobodies ended both the misconceptions and the arguments."

"The boy's name was Roxas. And he was a Nobody. Did Sora explain to you what a Nobody is?" Yen Sid asked.

The teens nodded, unsure. Sora had told them that Nobodies were created 'when a person with an especially strong heart is turned into a Heartless.'

"Roxas told me about Nobodies. And I believe that I am the first outsider to have ever heard this tale. He also told me about Organization XIII, and his own role in involvement in the conquest and destruction of many worlds. Roxas was a traitor, you see. He wanted to cause trouble for the Organization, so that they would have bigger problems to deal with than one wayward Nobaby. In turn, I informed the King, and he began a campaign that would eventually destroy that evil order. At the same time, I became aware of another presence in Twilight Town. You see, I always assumed that all the interference in the town came from one, specific source. But now that I had identified the Nobodies and the Organization, I became aware that there must be someone else trying to take advantage of your world's unique properties. Though I didn't know it at the time, this was Ansem the Wise, or Darkness in Zero, or Diz, as he often called himself. He was both target and predator of Roxas, and the main reason that Roxas was trying to draw his comrade's attention away from himself. It was a brilliant ploy, and might have worked had Riku not left the King's side and joined Diz, to battle what he saw as the single greatest obstacle in Sora's path to recovery."

"Sora, at this time, was, of course, in an enchanted sleep to regain his memories. He had had his mind almost completely erased by the Memory Witch Namine, under the Organizations orders, and then placed inside a restoration lotus in which to recover them, and then both Sora and Namine had been stolen away by Diz, whose goal was to empower Sora by destroying Roxas."

The surprise on the Twilight Town gang's faces was evident.

"He was doomed to fail, of course." Yen Sid said, and the relief became the dominant expression on their faces. "But in the meantime, he created a 'fake' Twilight Town, in order to keep him in. For you see, Roxas was a powerful Nobody and a great warrior, and it had taken a lot of luck and sacrifice on Riku's part to subdue him. Both Riku and Diz knew that they may not find themselves so lucky a second time around, and that inevitably, the boy would try to escape. It would only be a matter of time before he would succeed, and they needed all the time they could get in order to restore Sora. The town was built to keep Roxas complacent, understanding that as long as he didn't realize anything was wrong, it would never occur to him to try to leave. Namine, in her love for Sora, also helped, and a great deal was learned on how the human mind remembers things as she revealed her methods to wipe Roxas's mind just as she had Sora's."

"Here is where my knowledge becomes insufficient." Yen Sid informed his audience. "I know that Roxas escaped the confines of Twilight town with no little amount of help from Namine, who, it seems equated his survival with her own, seeing as she herself was also a Nobody. Sora was released by the two, although he didn't actually see them, nor did any of them travel in the same way. Sora left to fight the Heartless once again, and Namine left with Diz and Riku, who later lost her back to the Organization. For as far as I can see, Roxas all but disappeared. His involvement is not mentioned in the defeat of Xeonort, or Xemnas, as he took to be called, and his insane plans to summon Kingdom Hearts, nor can I find any sign of him living anywhere on any known world."

The teens were disappointed. "All this time." Olette said. "and all this effort and we still can't find him."

"Roxas the Thirteenth was a master manipulator and a prodigy of stealth. If he doesn't want to be found, then we will not be the ones to unearth him."

"Did he fight Sora?" Hayner asked firmly.

"I beg your pardon?" Yen Sid said.

"Did he fight Sora? Is there any chance he was destroyed to make Sora more powerful? He was Sora's Nobody, right?"

"What? How do you know about that?"

"It doesn't take a genius to figure out. Sora had that weird transformation, that black crawly thing. And he has one of the strongest hearts around, or he wouldn't have been able to wield that key-weapon of his. It makes sense that, if he became a Heartless, then he would have a Nobody, and not just any Nobody, but a Master Nobody." Hayner had his arms crossed over his chest, and he looked grim. "I may not understand much about all this darkness and dawn, but this much, I can figure out on my own."

Yen Sid looked slightly harassed. "I don't know if the two ever even met, although it is a definite possibility."

"One more question." Hayner said. "Where is Sora, and how do we get there?"

Yen Sid gave a bark of a laugh. "The likes of you could never dream of crossing the paths between the worlds. You don't have the technology or the magic to make the journey, you don't have the knowledge or the training to use them if you did, and you don't have the munny to hire someone else to take you."

"Dammit, old man, if you're not going to help, then stay the hell out of our way." Hayner clenched one fist at him.

"Don't think that you can threaten me, boy." Yen Sid snapped at him. "You should be grateful that I have shared all that I have."

"We're going to find Roxas." Hayner sneered.

"A wasted effort. If Roxas doesn't want to be found, he won't be. If Roxas ever wanted a friend, he'd still stay as far away from this place as possible. And if Roxas is still alive today, which I doubt, he is still a Nobody; even if he does remember his time in Diz's fake reality, there's no telling what he would do to you if you confronted him. Nobodies don't have hearts, they don't have friends, they don't have feelings, and they certainly don't spend any amount of time with normal people unless it is absolutely necessary!"

Instead of flinging out a comeback or accepting defeat, which is what Yen Sid expected the boy to do, Hayner exchanged a look with his friends. They remembered the video of Roxas and Hayner in the rain. They knew that none of what Yen Sid was necessarily true.

Yen Sid saw this exchange and wondered if he had overplayed his hand. What were they thinking?

Olette stood first. "Thank you for all of your help." She said, and bowed politely. Pence and Hayner did like wise. "We will not take up any of your time today." She strode out the door and her guys quickly followed suit.

The fairy women were waiting for them on the first landing down, presenting tea and eatables on plates of gold and silver with inlaid patterns of stars. The teens accepted things to nibble on, but were in a hurry to get back home.

"Nonsense." The one in red told them. "You'll be staying here. It's so late, it's almost early. Come, come, I'll show you to your rooms."

Had they been able to press it, the fairy ladies probable would have tucked them into bed. It was three on three as the kids tried to politely refuse their hostesses, who seemed a little starved for something to mother and dote on. In the end, the door was shut and the kids were able to tuck themselves into sturdy wooden beds in a room on the ground floor. They each swallowed the last of the crumbs from the snacks that they had selected from the plates (which had been left on a table in their room) and pulled off their shoes and settled back. The only reason that any of them got any sleep that night was the fact that they had gotten up at four in the morning and it was now five-thirty A.M.the next day.

**Only one more chapter to go. If you have yet to review, now's the time to do it!**


	7. Chapter 7

**Wow. I finally finished one of my fanfics. It's a good feeling. Sorry about the wait, my mom and I went on a trip for a couple of days to take a tour of the university campus that I'll be attending in the fall. **

The place where the fairies had left them was a dormitory of sorts; eight low beds stuck out at regular intervals from the walls, and end tables and washstands were spaced between them. Upon rising the next day, the three of them spent a few minutes to orient themselves, both in their surroundings and in the events of the previous day. Light flowed in from the large windows on the opposite end of the room from the door, but there was no sun. Instead, the deep colors from last night's 'sky' had brightened into pastels and more vivid shades.

For a while, they all just sat there, staring at one another.

"Okay," Hayner finally sighed, "we know why Roxas disappeared, we know all about the word thief and why we were having problems with our memories, we also-"

"No, not really." Pence interrupted. "Just because we found that computer and what was on it doesn't mean we now know what is going on with our memories. There is no reason for that data to have been dispersed among us. I told you: no one had been on that computer besides me for ages, so unless that memory lady has decided to start causing trouble, we still need to figure out what's going on."

"Okay. But at least we know where all of this is coming from." Said Hayner. "We know why our memories and reality don't seem to line up, and we know what Sora's involvement in all of this was. We've even managed to find out what's up with that weird mansion. So really, the only missing piece of the puzzle is 'what happened to Roxas.'"

"There has to be some way of getting a hold of Sora." Olette said softly. "It always comes back to him. Even if he has no idea what happened to Roxas, he would still be able to help us search other worlds for him."

Silence struck again. Yen Sid wouldn't be of any more help, he had pretty much proven that. Who else was there? The fairy ladies?

Speaking of the fairy ladies, one of them, the green one, poked her head in the door, and upon seeing them awake, she turned back and called out "They're awake! Come on in, Merryweather!"

Merryweather appeared to be the one all dressed in blue, and she bustled in carrying another huge tray piled with food. She set it down before them, bidding them try certain things.

"Did you sleep well?" she also asked.

Olette's answer was a yawn. "Well enough."

"What time is it?" Hayner asked.

"Why, it's almost noon." She told them. "but don't worry about that, I know you didn't get to bed until some ungodly hour."

"Heh. That sure beats curfew." Hayner smirked, and then stopped. "Oh my God!" he exclaimed "Curfew!"

"None of us came home last night!" Pence also realized.

Olette voiced their fears. "We are going to be in _so_ much trouble!"

A panic followed them as they jumped from their seats. "We've got to get back!"

"Now, now," the two fairies tried to calm them. "there's time enough to eat your brunch first."

"We'll eat on the way." Pence bargained, and he reached for some of the more transportable items.

"You don't understand." Olette pleaded. "We were gone all yesterday, all last night, and all this morning!"

"Worrying about it isn't going to help you any." The-fairy-lady-who-wasn't-Merryweather told them. "You can't leave without the locomotive, and Master Sid took that into town some time ago."

"So we're stuck here?" Olette had to coach herself not to whine.

"Afraid so." 'Merryweather' put her hands on her hips and seemed to puff up at them. "So you all sit down and eat your food."

They meekly obeyed her, but that didn't mean they had to like it.

"Aw, man, my pops is going to ground me for a month!" Hayner complained.

"_My_ dad is going to think we've been doing something inappropriate, _again_!"

Olette predicted. "And my mom isn't going to back me up this time, because she's been freaking out over this whole 'child kidnapper' thing."

"It's not like we've never pulled an all-nighter before," Pence rationalized. "But with the whole town on high alert, we're never going to get away with this one. It'll be all over the place by now, our teachers will have noticed we're missing too."

"Oh, _crap_! We're missing class! I missed that essay we were supposed to do for Mr. Francis!" Hayner didn't notice the look of their hostesses at his use of profanity.

"Bah, I hate missing my German class. It's so hard to catch up." Moaned Olette.

They all munched in silence after that.

Yen Sid rolled back in about one o'clock, and he 'harrumphed' his way past them towards the stairs to his office.

"Now you may go." Flora, the one in green, told them.

"Do take care," Fauna, the one in red, echoed.

"Come visit us again sometime!" Merryweather waved them goodbye.

Dejectedly, thinking grim thoughts on what awaited them at home, the teenaged three piled into their transport. The incredible scenery on the way there did little to cheer them up.

"Hey, guys?" Olette asked them sadly.

"Yeah?"

"We'll find him, right? Someday, we'll know for sure what happened."

"Definitely."

"No doubt about it."

Even if their goal had not been met, they knew now that, whatever happened, Roxas was just beyond their reach. All it would take is one more push.

The station was very crowded when they arrived. Through the windows, they could see that people had noticed the strangely decorated train without a conductor. Timidly, they stepped out, and their initial thought was to try and sneak out quitetly.

"WHERE IN _GOD'S_ NAME HAVE YOU BEEN?" Seifer roared at them.

"Umm…"

"DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA THE TROUBLE YOU'VE CAUSED?"

"Well-"

"THE ENTIRE TOWN IS IN A PANIC, AND IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT!"

"STOP SHOUTING!" Hayner shouted over him.

"I'M NOT SHOUTING!"

"YES YOU ARE!

"NO I'M NOT!"

Olette placed a hand on Hayner's shoulder and the two plus Pence tried to pull away from the foaming-at-the-mouth Seifer. Unfortunately, the crowded station seemed to be entirely made up of the team that had previously been searching for Roxas, or at least his body.

"Uh, we really need to be getting home." Olette tried to tell them all.

"You better believe you're going home!" Olette's mother, puffy-eyed from crying, forced her way through. She grabber her daughter by the arm, and stared her right in the eye. "And you're going to stay there! What were you thinking? Do you have any idea how worried we were? You are grounded, do you hear me, grounded!" she started dragging her away.

Olette shot one last look at Hayner, but they were quickly separated by the bodies of many people. Hayner looked around for Pence, but the other boy's parents had come up to claim their wayward child too, they were just a little more quiet about it. That left Hayner standing there under Seifer's glare and surrounded by the now-dispersing crowd.

Seifer looked around, as if expecting to see an adult come tearing in to take this last nuisance off his hands. He was disappointed, but Hayner wasn't. Hayner knew that his step-dad would be glad to have him gone, and his mom was too timid to do anything that her husband didn't approve of. Hayner's real dad, bless his heart, was the kind to turn to drink in a time of crisis.

When Seifer seemed sufficiently distracted, Hayner tried to break off and go home, but he was quickly surrounded by Seifer's gang.

"Where do you think you're going?" Rai said threateningly.

"Home." Hayner told him flatly. "It's where I'm supposed to be."

"A little later." Seifer said. "First, you're going to tell us where you've been."

"Bah." Hayner waved him off. "It's none of your beeswax."

"We'll see about that."

"You can't keep me from my parents' place." Hayner tried to remind him.

"Your parents need to come and get you." Siefer made up on the spot. "In the mean time, we're going to have a little chat about _that_ thing." He jerked his thumb back at the empty tracks.

"Talk about what?" Hayner smirked at him.

"_That_!" Seifer turned around to point at where the ghost train had sat, but found it missing. "Hey, where'd it go?"

"It went back where it came from." Hayner said as if Seifer was a retard or something.

"But there wasn't a driver. And we didn't hear it leave."

"Of course." Hayner took advantage of the group's confusion to slip past them. "It is the ghost train, after all." He stared walking home.

He was not alone in his trek. The Town Disciplinary Committee followed him as he strolled along. Eventually, Seifer slid up from behind him to fall into step next to him.

"You four weenies were on the hilltop, looking for the ghost train, right before he disappeared."

"Yup."

"And that's what you've been trying to do for the last couple of days. You were trying to search for that train."

"Yup."

"Find anything?"

Hayner didn't know how to answer that question. They had answered so many questions, but they still had nothing to show for their work.

"Well?" Seifer asked, impatient.

"We found…" Hayner let out a breath. "…related stuff. But we don't know where Roxas is yet."

"And what about that Sora kid? Did he have anything to do with it?"

"Well, yes and no. He was involved, or rather, Roxas was involved with him, but it was all sort of indirect."

"Are the two related?"

"I just told you, _indi-_"

"I mean like family, blood-relations and stuff."

"Oh."

"And? Are they?"

"Umm, that one's kinda complicated."

"Hmm. And do you have any way of finding him, either?"

"Not unless you've got a space ship tucked up your ass."

Seifer was notably and understandably confused by this answer.

"The search team is just about done. They're giving it two more days, and then they're going to disband." Seifer told Hayner.

"I figured they would eventually."

They had arrived at the street where Hayner's mom lived with her husband and Hayner's little brother. Angry words floated out of the thin walls, and Hayner didn't hide his disgust at the situation that his mom had dug for herself and for her youngest child. He strolled on by, knowing that he couldn't do a damn thing to help. If Roxas was here, he would have on the spot come up with some excuse to waltz in and take the kid out for a day, but Hayner couldn't think that fast.

Hayner spared a thought to wonder what Seifer and his gang were doing still following him, but dismissed it as them wanting to have a few words with his father. Good luck fishing him out of what ever bottle he had crawled into.

Three blocks later, Hayner pulled out his keys and jogged up the steps to his apartment. The three flights of stairs reminded him of Yen Sid's lofty tower, but then he was at his door and turning the knob.

As expected, the television was on and Hayner's dad was collapsed on the couch in front of it. Hayner escaped to his room, not wanting to watch as Seifer and his gang tried to prod the man awake and tell him to properly discipline his son.

In the safety of his room, Hayner wondered how he had ever gotten this far without Roxas. In the fake world, Roxas would invite him to spend the night, knowing full well that Hayner would resent the 'charity' and still be unable to refuse a night away from the stink of the messy apartment and his flatulent parent. Life was just better with Roxas in it. It just was.

After their return from Yen Sid's, life slowly returned to normal in the small town. The search team did indeed disband, having run out of places to look. Slowly, the posters of Roxas faded away, worn down by weather and never replaced. Hayner, Pence, and Olette took their lumps from their parents, and their acceptance of their being grounded seemed to surprise everyone. Although they all still saw each other at school, they were having trouble talking to one another. It was simply too big, too much to wrap their minds around. But as the sharpness of that day's memories also faded, they brought up the courage to talk and voice their thoughts on the matter.

Pence eventually made one last trip to the mansion. He went alone, as Hayner and Olette were busy trying to make sure no one noticed that he was missing for the afternoon. When he returned, he told them how the place was all coated in some glowing green barrier. Yen Sid had made sure that no further problems would arise from that place.

"It was a glitch in the system." Pence explained to them. "the hard drive was almost full, the system was shutting down, even its power was fading. Diz had wanted a failsafe if Roxas had ever escaped, so he but in a default path of action for his creation. In case of any problems, the system was to over-write all of our memories and give us all the data from the fake Twilight town, so that Roxas could never guess that his life inside there was a sham. And that's just what it was doing."

"So he stopped it? Yen Sid stopped the computer from running anymore?" Olette asked.

"Looks that way. I couldn't get anywhere near that stuff. The searches I started should have long since finished, but now I'll never reach them."

"I wonder why he blocked it off instead of just leveling the place?" Hayner voiced.

"I kinda get the feeling that Yen Sid isn't much of a computer person. He may

have been worried about the possible consequences." Pence theorized.

Without that particular source of information, they were stuck waiting again. Dejected, beaten, they could think of nothing else to do.

Life went on. Finals came and went. Summer started again. Now, when people looked at them, they didn't automatically ask if there had been any news, or offer condolences. Without realizing it, the group of friends started thinking of him less and less, although he was always in their hearts. When they all got together, they could talk of things other than the friend they had lost, and later, alone, when they individually realized that they had gone the entire day without talking or even thinking about him, it hurt a little less each lime.

Sitting atop the train station tower one day, they all watched the struggle supporter putting up signs. Olette pulled out something from her pockets.

It was the little blue orb from the trophy that had been awarded to Roxas in the fake town.

"Resolve and promises are all well and good," she said, "but it doesn't change the fact that, unlike Sora, destiny will not allow us to leave this world to search for Roxas."

"We'll find him." Hayner said. "Remember what Yen Sid was saying; our world has some sort of scientific value. Someone will come poking their noses around, and we'll hitch a ride."

"But how are we supposed to locate him?" Olette said sadly. "There are dozens, probably hundreds of worlds out there. It would be like looking for a needle in a haystack."

"Our hearts will guide us." Pence told her. "Look at Sora. He had _two_ people he was looking for, and he found both of them. It's not because he visited every world, or had everybody out looking for them. It's because he followed his heart, straight to them. And we'll do the same. All of our hearts are connected to Roxas's, too.

"Doesn't being a Nobody mean that you don't have a heart?" Hayner pointed out.

"Maybe. But Nobodies aren't supposed to have feelings either. Just you wait and see."

**And thus, the stage is set for KH 3 to start. What will happen? Only those lucky bastards at square enix know. On another note, if it turns out that in KH 3, there is no sign of Hayner, Pence, Olette, or even Roxas and Sora, (as it is rumored that the game will have a whole new cast of characters) then I may just write a sequal. Maybe. If I feel like it. **


End file.
